


Vital

by Darth_Nonie



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Gen, Vampires, Werewolves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 1999-08-04
Updated: 1999-08-04
Packaged: 2018-02-10 03:50:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2009901
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Darth_Nonie/pseuds/Darth_Nonie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Buffy and friends have been trapped underground for days, and Angel's not at his best. Fits vaguely around mid-Season 3.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Vital

Vital  
by Darth Nonie

Buffy and the Scoobs have been trapped for days in an underground space--old mine with some sealed-off areas? Bomb shelter? Signs of previous occupancy, a few bits of old furniture, wooden walls 'n' doors between sections.

Angel wakes up, in pain and Wanting.

Looks towards the door to see a sturdy small figure leaning there, arms folded, dyed hair still dapper despite his chipped fingernail polish. Oz gives Angel a brief nod.

Angel gets to his feet unsteadily and starts that direction.

"Yo," says Oz.

Angel is trying to find words through the fever-haze of need, and stumbles towards the door, but Oz does not move out of the way.

"Oz?" Confused.

Quirk at corner of mouth, and Oz actually says more than his usual couple of words. "The others are kinda busy, Angel. Thought we should keep each other out of trouble."

Angel, still confused, leans his aching head against the stone wall and tries to think. "Oz, I-- Oh, fuck, if we don't get out of here soon, I'm gonna--" he breaks off, sick at himself.

" 'He feels the need: The need to feed,' " Oz, wryly.

Angel looks up wildly under half-formed brow ridges, far from amused. For a moment, his nostrils flare to catch Oz's scent, then his face shifts back and he slams his fist against the wall in self-hatred and frustration. The pain does not help.

Then, jaw clamping hard, he lifts the unsteady chair and smashes it without warning against the wall, lifting one long splinter of broken chair-leg contemplatively.

"Bad idea," Oz, still expressionless, says quietly. "They need you. For this plan they're working on. Without you, everybody dies."

Angel's hand tightens uncontrollably on the stake, but he says nothing.

Oz looks down at his polished nails. " 'Bout half an hour to moonrise," he says casually as if discussing the weather. "Liability central."

"--Plan?"

"Yeah," says Oz. "They have a plan. You and Buffy and Giles are vital. I'm kind of a footnote."

"And--Willow?" says Angel, foggily trying to sort out his fellow abductees in his head.

"Willow," Oz's voice says conversationally, "is even more vital." After a moment's thought, he adds, "To me."

"Xander?" 

"Not here."

Angel remembers now. Xander's probably off trading jabs with Cordelia and wondering how the rest of them are saving the world without him.

"Uh," says Angel finally, trying to shake some level of coherence into his aching head, but it doesn't work.

Oz just leans there, sturdy and very much Oz, waiting for Angel to make sense of things.

Angel's brow furrows, shifts, shifts back with effort as he puts thoughts together into words. "Look, Oz, I don't think I'm going to be any help to them, the way I am right now."

"Yo," says Oz again, still quiet.

Angel's eyes lock onto him fully for the first time since he woke up, but he's lost the words again. "Uh--"

With a faint, patient sigh, Oz reaches up to open the neck of his own jacket.

"--Oz?"

That small quirk of the mouth again, almost a smile. "Better get on with it, unless you like...puppy chow."

Angel moves in, planning to get through Oz's head how stupid this is, but then he gets the smell of him, hears his heart beating. Fights himself back and still asks, "Oz, why--?"

"You're not expendable," Oz says, slow and clear. "So it's me or Willow."

"--Willow," Angel says, not making a choice but still trying to puzzle things out.

"Not an option," Oz says almost mildly, then tugs on his collar again and pointedly lifts his jaw.

Angel is definitely not going to do this, he wants nothing to do with it, he refuses utterly, so he's a bit surprised to hear Oz grunt slightly as his teeth go in. The taste of him is rich and wild, subtle, so strong and hot and vital, as necessary as breathing when he was mortal. Oz.

And then, of course, he has nothing more to say.

*****

Later, Oz's transformation startles him out of his red dream, jarring him as if his own heart had suddenly shifted. When Angel can finally make himself stop, the young werewolf is unconscious but still breathing. His recovery should be faster than some.


End file.
